''' INFO : If you are looking for any information related to SD Cards and setup look

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There is some restructuring going on , we are sorry for the inconvenience. '''

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[[RPi Easy SD Card Setup | here]] There is some restructuring going on , we are sorry for the inconvenience. '''

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=About This Page - For Contributors=

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The intention of this page is to provide a '''starting point''' for beginners and to '''direct them to''' the kind of information a person would need in order to start doing something useful or interesting with a Raspberry Pi.

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It is not intended to contain or replicate much of the information already available on-line or elsewhere in the wiki, however please create new wiki pages and link them here if there is information beginners will find useful (similarly any section which grows too much here, should be separated into new pages as and when needed)!

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At the moment building up ideas of content of typical things beginners will want to know and the kind of things they will want to do first.

# VNC connection for the monitorily challenged Noob [[RPi_Wheezy_VNC|VNC for a wheezy install]] (noobs that are using the Blind Login)

# If you've done all that, and you are wondering what next...'''welcome and read on!'''

# If you've done all that, and you are wondering what next...'''welcome and read on!'''

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References needed (idea for new section Living Without RPi, which can guide users or link to info to users who haven't got RPis)

References needed (idea for new section Living Without RPi, which can guide users or link to info to users who haven't got RPis)

Link to emulation builds or live linux cds setup for beginners (RacyPy2 for example)

Link to emulation builds or live linux cds setup for beginners (RacyPy2 for example)

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If you don't have a Raspberry Pi yet, you can still try things out, see xxxx for details.

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If you don't have a Raspberry Pi yet, you can still try things out, see [http://sourceforge.net/projects/rpiqemuwindows/ Windows RPi Emulator] for details.

=What is Linux and why not use Windows?=

=What is Linux and why not use Windows?=

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[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux Wikipedia]

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux Wikipedia]

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Also see [http://elinux.org/RPi_End-user_FAQ End-User FAQ]

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Also see [[RPi_End-user_FAQ End-User|FAQ]]

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And [http://elinux.org/Will_RPi_Run Running XXX on the RPi]

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And [[Will_RPi_Run|Running XXX on the RPi]]

=Basic Debian RPi Setup=

=Basic Debian RPi Setup=

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When you first turn on your Raspberry Pi with it's fresh Debian image on the SD card, you may have to make some minor adjustments to the OS configuration files to suit your location. The default location setting (locale) is the UK.

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When you first turn on your Raspberry Pi with it's fresh Debian image on the SD card, you will likely want to tweak the system settings.

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== Default login and password ==

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See the ''Username:Password'' column of [[RPi_Distributions#Available Distributions|distributions table]] to access your Pi.

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== Locale settings ==

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By configuring the [[wikipedia:locale|locale]] settings, you can change the language and country settings (e.g. to get correct sorting behaviour) for much of the software available for the RPi. The default RPi locale is English/Great Britain ("en_GB").

You can alter this with

You can alter this with

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sudo dpkg-reconfigure locales

sudo dpkg-reconfigure locales

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There are quite a lot of options - many people will want to use the UTF-8 variant for their locale. This will also allow you to set anomalous cases

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You will get a very long list of possible locales. You can enable/disable a locale by pressing the spacebar (not Enter), and scroll through the list using the arrow keys or PgUp/PgDn.

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like English keyboard but Danish locale.

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Selecting All locales will generate all possible locales, take a very long time and use a great deal of space. Generate only those you wish to use.

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Selecting "All locales" will generate all possible locales, taking a very long time and using a great deal of space. Select only those you wish to use.

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The command above will open a list which begins

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''It is highly recommended to stick to the UTF-8 locales'', and to leave the en_GB.UTF-8 locale enabled, in addition to any other locales you enable.

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aa_DJ [Ambala, for Djibouti] ISO-8059-1 and goes down to zu_._UTF8 UTF-81 [Zulu for S. Africa]

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If you're unsure of which locale to pick, look up a [[wikipedia:List of ISO 639-1 codes|two-letter language code]] and a [[wikipedia:ISO 3166-1 alpha-2#Officially assigned code elements|two-letter country code]] on Wikipedia, and see if you can find a matching locale.

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You have various options for each language - UTF-8 is probably the most useful worldwide - Unicode characters.

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When you're done picking locale(s), press Enter. You will be prompted to select a default locale as well.

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Scroll down using a down arrow key, toggle with a space bar to select.

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== Keyboard layout ==

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==Keyboard Mapping==

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If different letters appear on-screen from that which you typed, you need to reconfigure you keyboard settings. In Debian, from a command line type:

If different letters appear on-screen from that which you typed, you need to reconfigure you keyboard settings. In Debian, from a command line type:

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sudo dpkg-reconfigure keyboard-configuration

sudo dpkg-reconfigure keyboard-configuration

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Follow the prompts. Then restart your RasPi.<br />'''Or:'''<br /> From the command line type:

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Follow the prompts.

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'''Or:''' From the command line type:

sudo nano /etc/default/keyboard

sudo nano /etc/default/keyboard

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Then find where it says <blockquote>XKBLAYOUT=”gb”</blockquote>and change the gb to the two letter code for your country. [http://www.raspberrypi.org/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?p=78325#p78325]

Also, see the [[R-Pi_Troubleshooting#Re-mapping_the_keyboard_with_Debian_Squeeze|Troubleshooting Guide]] for more information about remapping the keyboard.

Also, see the [[R-Pi_Troubleshooting#Re-mapping_the_keyboard_with_Debian_Squeeze|Troubleshooting Guide]] for more information about remapping the keyboard.

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Changes will certainly be picked up at the next restart.

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You may need to restart for the changes to take effect.

If you get a very long delay during the keyboard mapping at startup, type the following once on the command line after you have logged in:

If you get a very long delay during the keyboard mapping at startup, type the following once on the command line after you have logged in:

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sudo setupcon

sudo setupcon

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==Create a new User and add it to the sudoers list==

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If the selected keyboard layout is not applied in the console (that is, when not running under X), try:

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Type in following command in the Terminal to create a new user:

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sudo apt-get install console-data

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sudo adduser username

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Follow the Steps. After creating the new User you must get root Access with the following Command:

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sudo su

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Now you can add your user to the sudoers list:

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visudo

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Add following Line under the "root ALL=(ALL) ALL" Line:

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yourUsername ALL=(ALL) ALL

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Now press CTRL+K X to save and exit the editor.

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Alternatively instead of adding the user to the sudoers list, you can add your user to the sudo group with the following command:

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== Timezone ==

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useradd -G sudo yourUsername

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Unless you live in Great Britain, you'll have to change the default timezone:

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==Change the Timezone==

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Unless you live in Great Britain, you'll have to change the default timezone. Use "sudo" to obtain temporary execute permissions.

sudo dpkg-reconfigure tzdata

sudo dpkg-reconfigure tzdata

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Follow the prompts to finish the config. The change should be immediate.

Follow the prompts to finish the config. The change should be immediate.

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== Create a new user with sudo-privileges ==

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'''NOTE:Be careful when using visudo! If you use the incorrect format, you may not be able to sudo for any user!'''

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''If you do manage to invalidate your /etc/sudoers file, see section "Repair /etc/sudoers file" on how to recover''

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You may want to create a new user account for yourself.

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Type in following command in the terminal to create a new user (for example the user john):

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sudo adduser john

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Follow the steps.

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To allow the newly created user to use the "sudo" command, type:

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sudo visudo

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Add following line under the "root ALL=(ALL) ALL" Line:

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john ALL=(ALL) ALL

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Now press CTRL+O, X to save and exit the editor.

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Alternatively instead of adding the user to the sudoers list, you can add your user to the sudo group with the following command:

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adduser john sudo

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== Repair /etc/sudoers file ==

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sudo: parse error in /etc/sudoers near line 29

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sudo: no valid sudoers sources found, quitting

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sudo: unable to initialize policy plugin

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If you have edited your sudoers file and get the message above, do not worry - it is easy to recover

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pkexec bash

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You will be prompted for the pi password. The initial password for pi is "raspberry"

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You will now be connected as root user. Use "visudo" to repair the configuration file

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== Debian Wheezy, using raspi-config ==

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Debian Wheezy has a menu that will do some of the above and more. See [[RPi_raspi-config|raspi-config]]

=Intro to the CLI (Command Line Interface)=

=Intro to the CLI (Command Line Interface)=

You will need to use the Command Line Interface at some point in your management of the RPi. The command line interface is a powerful way to interact with the Raspberry Pi and is well worth learning some basic commands to get started with.

You will need to use the Command Line Interface at some point in your management of the RPi. The command line interface is a powerful way to interact with the Raspberry Pi and is well worth learning some basic commands to get started with.

For an introductory guide to some basic commands please see: [http://elinux.org/CLI_Spells Command Line Interface "Must Have" Commands]. Featured on the Raspberry Pi [http://www.raspberrypi.org/archives/1414 home page] was also a link to this site for [http://linuxcommand.org/learning_the_shell.php "learning the shell"]

Your SD card may boot into a GUI, if not and you are done with the text interface and want to use a graphical one instead, run:

Your SD card may boot into a GUI, if not and you are done with the text interface and want to use a graphical one instead, run:

This means that you can run everything on your Rpi with only the network attached. Provided you know which ip address it has. With appropriate software installed on your Winodws, Mac or Linux PC, you can also run a gui remotely.

This means that you can run everything on your Rpi with only the network attached. Provided you know which ip address it has. With appropriate software installed on your Winodws, Mac or Linux PC, you can also run a gui remotely.

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[[RPi Remote Access|Remote Access]]

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=Adding more software to your Raspberry Pi=

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Prior to your initial remote access it is recommended that you regenerate unique host public/private ID keys with the following command

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You will probably want to add software to your Raspberry Pi. Here you can find out how to do it.

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rm /etc/ssh/ssh_host_* && dpkg-reconfigure openssh-server

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[http://elinux.org/Add_software Adding Software]

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More details about remote access (including remote GUI are at [[RPi Remote Access]]

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=Installing and updating software to your Raspberry Pi=

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You will probably want to add software to your Raspberry Pi, as well as keep the current packages up to date. With Raspbian this is performed using apt-get. The most common commands can be found in the [http://elinux.org/Add_software adding software page]. It is good practice to regularly ensure you run the update and upgrade commands detailed in the [http://elinux.org/Add_software guide] to ensure you have the most up to date software packages.

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The apt-get package for Raspbian will also keep the GPU firmware updated to the latest stable release. If you'd like to try the bleeding edge releases you can read more on the [http://elinux.org/RPi_Software#GPU_bootloaders RPi Software].

=Adding USB Storage to Your Raspberry Pi=

=Adding USB Storage to Your Raspberry Pi=

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Sooner or later, you're going to run out of room on the SD card used to boot up your Raspberry Pi. For a tutorial on how to connect USB flash drives and hard drives to your Pi to expand storage, see: [http://elinux.org/Adding_USB_Drives_to_a_Raspberry_Pi Adding USB Drives to a Raspberry Pi]

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Sooner or later, you're going to run out of room on the SD card used to boot up your Raspberry Pi. For a tutorial on how to connect USB flash drives and hard drives to your Pi to expand storage, see: [http://elinux.org/RPi_Adding_USB_Drives Adding USB Drives to a Raspberry Pi]

=Beginner Projects=

=Beginner Projects=

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Reference needed - a good guide on how to backup and restore cards or software to do this easily

Reference needed - a good guide on how to backup and restore cards or software to do this easily

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==Backup your SD card==

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For Windows users the 'Raw HDD Copy Tool' from HDD Guru works well to backup and restore your SD card between projects.

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This can backup and restore the entire card sector by sector to/from an img file, and doesn't care which file system is on the card.

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[http://hddguru.com/software/HDD-Raw-Copy-Tool/ Raw HDD Copy Tool]

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Linux and Mac OS(X) users can use the [http://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/dd-invocation.html dd] tool that comes with most versions of Linux (including Raspbian) to save the contents of an SD card as an image file. Warning: be sure to use this tool carefully as accidentally choosing your hard drive as the output will destroy all data on it.

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Mac OSX users can use [http://sourceforge.net/projects PiCloner]. The PiCloner app is easy to use and will help you detect your SD card, back it up to an img file and is able to compress the img using GZIP to decrease backup size. PiCloner is Free Open Source Software (FOSS) released under a BSD License so it's '''Free''' as in; '''Free Beer'''!

==Media Player==

==Media Player==

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DesignSpark have written an article on this, which is worth a look, [http://www.designspark.com/content/raspberry-pi-goes-movies DesignSpark - Raspberry Pi goes to the movies]

DesignSpark have written an article on this, which is worth a look, [http://www.designspark.com/content/raspberry-pi-goes-movies DesignSpark - Raspberry Pi goes to the movies]

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Reference needed - links to a specific wiki page covering this in detail or links to projects like

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You can download an installer from www.raspbmc.com which will install to your desktop (IOS, Windows, Linux) and write the latest install to your SD card. You then boot your Pi with the card and go through the config steps.

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OpenElec, CrystalBuntu, Raspbmc etc

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There is a breif video basic tutorial here: http://www.instructables.com/id/RaspberryPi-Media-center-XMBC/

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''Reference needed - More information is needed on specific configuration choices for raspbmc, although raspbmc.com does have a wiki.''

==Play Games==

==Play Games==

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In the latest Debian, Python (+Pygame) and MIT Scratch are pre-installed.

In the latest Debian, Python (+Pygame) and MIT Scratch are pre-installed.

*Entering "sudo apt-get install abiword-common" into a terminal will install AbiWord, a lighter weight but still fully functional word processor

*Entering "sudo apt-get install abiword-common" into a terminal will install AbiWord, a lighter weight but still fully functional word processor

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*Entering "sudo apt-get install gnumeric" into a terminal will install Gnumeric, a lighter weight but still fully functional spreadsheet

More information needed

More information needed

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Of course, if you do anything interesting then please let us know in the [[RPi Projects |Projects]] section.

Of course, if you do anything interesting then please let us know in the [[RPi Projects |Projects]] section.

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=Living Without RPi=

=Living Without RPi=

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As discussed in the [[RPi Tutorial Easy GPIO Hardware & Software | Easy GPIO Hardware & Software]] tutorials, there are lots of alternative hardware you can use to experiment with (some as little as $5).

As discussed in the [[RPi Tutorial Easy GPIO Hardware & Software | Easy GPIO Hardware & Software]] tutorials, there are lots of alternative hardware you can use to experiment with (some as little as $5).

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=About This Page - For Contributors=

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The intention of this page is to provide a '''starting point''' for beginners and to '''direct them to''' the kind of information a person would need in order to start doing something useful or interesting with a Raspberry Pi.

−

=References=

+

It is not intended to contain or replicate much of the information already available on-line or elsewhere in the wiki, however please create new wiki pages and link them here if there is information beginners will find useful (similarly any section which grows too much here, should be separated into new pages as and when needed)!

+

+

At the moment building up ideas of content of typical things beginners will want to know and the kind of things they will want to do first.

If you've done all that, and you are wondering what next...welcome and read on!

References needed (idea for new section Living Without RPi, which can guide users or link to info to users who haven't got RPis)
Link to emulation builds or live linux cds setup for beginners (RacyPy2 for example)

If you don't have a Raspberry Pi yet, you can still try things out, see Windows RPi Emulator for details.

What is Linux and why not use Windows?

Linux is an operating system just like Windows, however, unlike Windows (which needs a set hardware requirement to run i.e. One Size fits or get different hardware), Linux comes in many varieties and configurations which means you can usually find a flavour (or Distribution) which fits your hardware big or small / fast or slow.

The Raspberry Pi is not suited to running Windows due to its hardware, but there are plenty of Linux Distributions which fit nicely. In addition to this, most Distributions of Linux are free, however Windows can cost many times the price of the Raspberry Pi itself.

Chances are you already have Linux running in your home without you even knowing it, since it is commonly used in modern TVs, Freeview and cable boxes to run things and ensure your recording of Inbetweeners or Prison Break gets done!

Default login and password

Locale settings

By configuring the locale settings, you can change the language and country settings (e.g. to get correct sorting behaviour) for much of the software available for the RPi. The default RPi locale is English/Great Britain ("en_GB").

You can alter this with

sudo dpkg-reconfigure locales

You will get a very long list of possible locales. You can enable/disable a locale by pressing the spacebar (not Enter), and scroll through the list using the arrow keys or PgUp/PgDn.

Selecting "All locales" will generate all possible locales, taking a very long time and using a great deal of space. Select only those you wish to use.

It is highly recommended to stick to the UTF-8 locales, and to leave the en_GB.UTF-8 locale enabled, in addition to any other locales you enable.

Repair /etc/sudoers file

If you have edited your sudoers file and get the message above, do not worry - it is easy to recover

pkexec bash

You will be prompted for the pi password. The initial password for pi is "raspberry"

You will now be connected as root user. Use "visudo" to repair the configuration file

Debian Wheezy, using raspi-config

Debian Wheezy has a menu that will do some of the above and more. See raspi-config

Intro to the CLI (Command Line Interface)

You will need to use the Command Line Interface at some point in your management of the RPi. The command line interface is a powerful way to interact with the Raspberry Pi and is well worth learning some basic commands to get started with.

Your SD card may boot into a GUI, if not and you are done with the text interface and want to use a graphical one instead, run:

startx

Remote Access

Your default install probably has a ssh (secure shell) "daemon" running.
This means that you can run everything on your Rpi with only the network attached. Provided you know which ip address it has. With appropriate software installed on your Winodws, Mac or Linux PC, you can also run a gui remotely.

Prior to your initial remote access it is recommended that you regenerate unique host public/private ID keys with the following command

Installing and updating software to your Raspberry Pi

You will probably want to add software to your Raspberry Pi, as well as keep the current packages up to date. With Raspbian this is performed using apt-get. The most common commands can be found in the adding software page. It is good practice to regularly ensure you run the update and upgrade commands detailed in the guide to ensure you have the most up to date software packages.

The apt-get package for Raspbian will also keep the GPU firmware updated to the latest stable release. If you'd like to try the bleeding edge releases you can read more on the RPi Software.

Adding USB Storage to Your Raspberry Pi

Sooner or later, you're going to run out of room on the SD card used to boot up your Raspberry Pi. For a tutorial on how to connect USB flash drives and hard drives to your Pi to expand storage, see: Adding USB Drives to a Raspberry Pi

Beginner Projects

Here are a few things you can try out with your Raspberry Pi, in most cases all you'll need is your SD Card loaded with a particular preconfigured OS Distribution.

It will be worth getting a few spare SD Cards if you think you will switch between setups regularly or become familiar with how to back up and restore your card.

Reference needed - a good guide on how to backup and restore cards or software to do this easily

Backup your SD card

For Windows users the 'Raw HDD Copy Tool' from HDD Guru works well to backup and restore your SD card between projects.
This can backup and restore the entire card sector by sector to/from an img file, and doesn't care which file system is on the card.

Linux and Mac OS(X) users can use the dd tool that comes with most versions of Linux (including Raspbian) to save the contents of an SD card as an image file. Warning: be sure to use this tool carefully as accidentally choosing your hard drive as the output will destroy all data on it.

Mac OSX users can use PiCloner. The PiCloner app is easy to use and will help you detect your SD card, back it up to an img file and is able to compress the img using GZIP to decrease backup size. PiCloner is Free Open Source Software (FOSS) released under a BSD License so it's Free as in; Free Beer!

Media Player

With this configuration you will typically have the Raspberry Pi connected to a TV or large monitor and a source of videos/music/photos etc you wish to play (i.e. Internet/hard-drive/local network etc).

You can download an installer from www.raspbmc.com which will install to your desktop (IOS, Windows, Linux) and write the latest install to your SD card. You then boot your Pi with the card and go through the config steps.

Entering "sudo apt-get install abiword-common" into a terminal will install AbiWord, a lighter weight but still fully functional word processor

Entering "sudo apt-get install gnumeric" into a terminal will install Gnumeric, a lighter weight but still fully functional spreadsheet

More information needed

Your Own Pet Project!

The sky is the limit really, with some time and effort any number of projects can be achieved.

Even if you don't have the skill to do it yourself, you can join like minded people by getting involved with one of the numerous groups in the Community Section, also within the Education pages or learn what you need in from the Guides & Tutorials sections.

Of course, if you do anything interesting then please let us know in the Projects section.

Living Without RPi

Even if you do not have any Raspberry Pi hardware there are a number things you can do to learn about linux, programming or even controlling hardware.

Using Linux

You can install a version of Linux on most computers, and many you will be able to "try out" Linux by using a "Live CD" - this will start your computer up running from a CD or DVD and run Linux (without installing anything to the computer itself).

RacyPy - This is a simple LiveCD of Puppy Linux which includes some basic programming languages and a light-weight graphical user interface (GUI).

Trying Programming

Many of the programming languages you can use on the Raspberry Pi can be installed on a Windows or Mac machine. Just visit the websites of the languages you are interested in and see if they have an installer for your operating system.

Controlling Hardware

As discussed in the Easy GPIO Hardware & Software tutorials, there are lots of alternative hardware you can use to experiment with (some as little as $5).

About This Page - For Contributors

The intention of this page is to provide a starting point for beginners and to direct them to the kind of information a person would need in order to start doing something useful or interesting with a Raspberry Pi.

It is not intended to contain or replicate much of the information already available on-line or elsewhere in the wiki, however please create new wiki pages and link them here if there is information beginners will find useful (similarly any section which grows too much here, should be separated into new pages as and when needed)!

At the moment building up ideas of content of typical things beginners will want to know and the kind of things they will want to do first.